Zuckerberg, Wife Gift $120M to California Schools

May 30, 2014BARBARA ORTUTAYThe Associated Press

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, are donating $120 million to public schools in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The gift, which the couple discussed Tuesday in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, will be spread over the next five years. It is the biggest allocation to date of the $1.1 billion in Facebook stock the couple pledged last year to the nonprofit Silicon Valley Community Foundation.

“Education is incredibly expensive and this is a drop in the bucket,” Chan, a pediatrician, said in an interview at Facebook’s Menlo Park, California, headquarters. “What we are trying to do is catalyze change by exploring and promoting the development of new interventions and new models.”

The first $5 million of the $120 million will go to the San Francisco, Ravenswood and Redwood City school districts and will focus on principal training, classroom technology and helping students transition from the 8th to the 9th grade. The couple and their foundation, called Startup: Education, determined the issues of most urgent need based on discussions with school administrators and local leaders.